


One For the Team

by elev



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Alien Cultural Differences, Aliens, Drunk Driving, F/M, IN SPACE!, Implied Tentacles, It doesn't last very long, Original Character(s), Probes, Rain is wet, Rick Sanchez Swears, Rick tries to be nice, Science Fiction, Swearing, Tentacles, in other news
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 20:46:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10929738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elev/pseuds/elev
Summary: “Well excUGHse me for trying to be nice,” Rick said, rolling his eyes. “You know what, I take it allll back. You—you abandoned your clothes and dignity back there for nothing, and-and-and your virtuous sacrifice was completely meaningless. P-people get stuff stuck up their orifices all the time, Lizzy. It's nothing to write home about.”





	One For the Team

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! This is my first Rick and Morty fic, so I'd really appreciate constructive criticism on the characters' voices!
> 
>  
> 
> In future chapters, the rating will, ahem, increase.

#####

With a suddenness that shouldn’t have been so _silent_ , the Kolorian mothership warped away with the disabled wreck of a ship nestled closely in its tractor beam, leaving behind a ghostly outline of crackling blue energy that slowly faded into the star-studded void around them.

Nobody spoke. Nobody moved, until Rick Sanchez reached into his lab coat and pulled out his flask, taking a long drag—by the time he was done, Elizabeth doubted there was any liquid left inside. He finished by making an obnoxious _pop_ with his lips, then put the flask back into his coat and fired up the ship’s engines.  The brilliant stars and technicolor nebulae wheeled and spun beyond the glass dome as he put the ship into a shaky turn and hit the accelerator a little too early. Morticia, who’d been exposed to Rick’s questionable driving for years, was ready for the G-forces and had braced herself, but Elizabeth found herself pushed back into the mottled, patchwork quilt of a seat as the little ship lept forward, streaking through the cosmos like a comet under the icy glow of a million stars.

“ I’m not—not gonna lie,” Rick said  after  a minute  to nobody in particular .  His voice was gravely, his lazy words slurred at the edges.  “That was fuUUGHcking shit.”  He let out another belch. “ They didn’t even—didn’t even  let  us keep any of the stuff  from the crash. ”

“ Well, I mean, it was kinda their ship in the first place, you know?” Morticia  said from the back seat.

“Jesus, _Morty_ ,” Rick said, “h-haven’t you ever heard of _finders keepers_?” He turned around to fix her with an annoyed glare,  his unibrow scrunched into a V-shaped scowl, but in the process tilted the steering wheel enough to throw all three occupants of the ship to the side. “Whoops!” He corrected lazily. “G-guess I shouldn’t have had all that—shouldn’t have drank that Kolorian beer from the cargo— _hic_!—hold.  That stuff gets you _wrecked,_ yo. ”

“ Gee Rick,”  Morticia said,  running her fingers through her  curly  brown hair, “uh, maybe I should drive?”

“ Y-you remember what happened last time you tried to land this thing, M-Morty?  Y- y ou got grounded for like, a month. I- I-I had to use my last Z-wave amplifier to wipe your parents’ memories  so we could go on  all those—so we could go on adventures again .”

“ Yeah well,  are you  _sure_ you don’t want me to drive? At least until we get to Earth?  You’re kinda wobbly. ”

“ Maybe I  could drive  for a bit ?” Elizabeth asked, eying the controls. They didn’t look  _too_ complicated—she’d seen cars back on Earth that had more buttons and levers.  Sure, there were lots of gadgets around the driver’s seat, but the main controls looked relatively simple.

Rick was having none of it.

“O-oh, _there’s_ an idea!” he said. “Let’s let the half-naked no ooooob who’s never been in a space ship take the wheel! L-let me guess, _Lizzy_ , y-y-you probably think it’s like driving a car.”

“It has a steering wheel and  three pedals,” Elizabeth pointed out. “It literally looks like the kind of controls you’d have on a car.  I know how to drive a stick, you know. ”

“That’s cute. A car. In s-space. I-I-I bet you think space is _flat_. You’re like—you’re like the flat  Earthers. Except in space. Flat spacer. N-n-now I don’t want to sound like I’m subscribing to—to planetary gender stereotypes, b-b-but yOUGH’d probably drive us straight into a black hole or something.”

“ It was just a suggestion,” Elizabeth said, sighing.  She pulled the stained lab coat tighter around her body  in a vain attempt to cover more skin , wishing for the dozenth time that she had something more substantial to wear.  Rick’s lab coat was better than nothing, but not by much.

“ L- look , I appreciate the conc ern , b- BU UGH t you’re really killing the mood here.  Let’s have some music or something. ”

Rick reached for the radio, a surprisingly normal-looking thing nestled between various high-tech devices on the control console between them. Crackling, static-laden music burst from the duct-taped speakers on the faded dash, spouting lyrics in a foreign language.

“— _Hielten sich für Captain Kirk—_ ”

“Nope,” Rick said, twisting the tuning knob.

“— _shit on the floor_ _—_ ”

“Can’t _believe_ that turned out to be a hit.”

“— _el otro día un comemierda italiano grasoso me trató de robar el carro_ —”

Static.

—incoherent warbling—

Static.

_“—listening to Earth Radio—”_

“Fuck _that_ shit,” Rick muttered, twisting the knob further. 

Finally, he found a station playing a song he seemed to like—some kind of dissonant, chaotic metal band with lyrics screamed in an alien language, an assault to the ears. He bopped his head along with the beat, each time nudging the wheel just enough to make the ship dip and rise to the rhythm of the alien drums.

Elizabeth mulled over the pros and cons of asking him to turn it down. The harsh, pounding rock n’ roll wasn’t going well with the budding headache from the alien drugs, and the bobbing ship didn’t help the nausea much. Whatever the aliens had injected her with had made her stomach churn awfully, but at least it hadn’t had any worse effects.

Fortunately, the song soon ended and was replaced with a soothing, synth-drenched tune that didn’t have as much of a beat. Elizabeth liked it; it was relaxing, in a sort of weird way, even though the alien timbre of the synths sent the hairs on the back of her neck standing straight up. Eventually, Rick turned down the music—evidently he wasn’t a fan. Elizabeth sighed happily, but her elation was short lived; a second later, Rick opened his mouth.

“Hey, Lizzy, you know, that was—that was actually a pretty cool thing you did back there. On that Kolorian freighter, I mean.” He indicated vaguely behind him with a jerk of his thumb. Their little ship wobbled, and from somewhere in the back came a concerning rattle. Rick didn't seem to notice. “Real hoUGHnerable and stuff. You-you really took one for the team.”

“It's not like there was a lot of choice,” Elizabeth mumbled, fidgeting with the lab coat and crossing her legs. “I didn't want Morty to end up getting...probed.”

“Eh, she's been through worse,” Rick said. At the dark look on Elizabeth's face, he quickly added, “I-I-I'm not saying it wouldn't have been—that it would've been a walk in the park, Lizzy. I'm just saying, out of alllll the things on the central finite cuUUUurrve, that was pretty much like, a one or two on the crazy adventure shit scale for her.”

From the backseat came a quiet mutter, something about seeds and intergalactic customs.

Rick didn't hear it. He continued, saying, “I mean, grandpa's been probed plenty of times, and-and-and it's not _all_ bad like they make it look in the—like it looks in the movies. D-did you know some aliens exchange information with other species by probing? They stick an electric probe waaaaay up your butthole—“ he punctuated his remark with a single finger, stuck straight up “—and it's like, two hundred times more efficient than talking. Three hundred if you have a vagina and they use two at once. A-a-and it—it barely even tingles! You get used to it real fast.”

“Uh, that's great,” Elizabeth said, wishing Rick would just keep his damn hands on the wheel. “But in case you somehow missed it, they weren't after 'communication' _._ They _explicitly_ said they wanted  a female to—”

Rick waved a dismissive hand. “Eh, same thing, pretty much. What's trading a few biological samples between carbon-based life forms? You're m-m-making a pretty big deal out of this, Lizzy.”

“What? _Me_? You're the one that made a deal out of it in the first place! You said it was taking one for the team!”

“Well _excUGHse_ me  for trying to be nice,” Rick said, rolling his eyes. “You know what, I take it _allll_ back.  You—you abandoned your clothes and dignity back there for nothing, and-and-and your virtuous sacrifice was completely meaningless. P-people get stuff stuck up their orifices all the time, _Lizzy_. It's nothing to write home about. ”

“Easy for you to say!” Elizabeth said. “You weren't the one tied to the table getting _probed_ by a giant squid! Rick, they injected me with crazy _drugs_ that _still_ haven't worn off! They stuck dil—uh—“ she glanced at the back seat “— _things_ inside me! ”

“Woah, I guess you're really the—really an expert in traumatizing transdimensional experiences now, aren't you? Hey, since you-you-you're such an expert, why don't you tell me what they do to, to, uh, humans like us on Tau Kappa Seven? Wh-what if the _Natikonites_ got their slimy tentacles on you and Morty instead of the Kolorians?”

“Uh, I dunno?” Elizabeth said. “But—“

“Of course you don't! If it'd been the Natikonites, they could've—they could've decided to vivisect you to figure out what makes humans complain so much! Or they could've put Morty in a brainalyzer, and-and pried apart her innermost thoughts until her cerebellum turned to mush!”

“That does sound pretty nasty—“ At this point, Elizabeth just wanted to concede so she didn’t have to listen to Rick’s boisterous, abrasive voice any longer. But Rick was on a roll, and there was no stopping him. Spittle flew from his lips as his voice grew louder in the enclosed cockpit. The ship shuddered and tilted as he threw his hands skyward, his eyes wide.

“And they might've—they could've done worse! They could've reprogrammed her to—to spew Federation propaganda like an emotionless, unquestioning robot! They could've taken away her individuality, and—and her curiosity, and her ability to rationally think about and criticize corrupt galactic governments!”

“Yeah, that's, uh, pretty bad,” Elizabeth said. She glanced back at Morticia, who didn't seem too invested in the current conversation. Morticia caught her eye and gave an apologetic little shrug, making blah-blah movements with her hand.

Rick was still babbling.

“...experimental dark mater suppositories, or-or brain-eating mushrooms—and then she'd be as dull and dumb as Jerry, and I'd have nobody to go on adventures with. Compared to all that, I-I'd say we got off pretty light. E-especially you.” Abruptly, he grinned, a line of drool glistening at the corner of his mouth. He pointed at Elizabeth. “Y-you ‘got off’ pretty good, if you know what I mean. Ha-ha!”

Elizabeth sighed, feeling the heat rush to her face. “Can we just not talk about it?”

“Fine, if you want to be a—want to be like that. I was just trying to complement you, you know.”

“Sure, fine, whatever. Thanks. Super flattered here.”

“Wow, y-y-you’re really killing the mood again. Let’s have some music, motherfuckaaaaaas!” And with that, he cranked up the stereo again.

Elizabeth pinched the bridge of her nose, stared out at the stars, and wished she were anywhere else.

#####


End file.
